


Passing Through Unconscious States (By way of Pennsylvania and Arizona)

by ok_thanks



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Future Fic, Getting Back Together, M/M, Not that emo tho pretty sappy, and is emo, dylan has to retire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:59:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21544777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ok_thanks/pseuds/ok_thanks
Summary: If Dylan’s being honest -- which he isn’t when his mother slides a mug across the counter to her, kitchen kicked up in the smell of dark roast and French toast, slightly burned and sticky with syrup -- he’ll say he thinks about Connor as often as he thinks of the weather, as often as he thinks of the clothes he’s wearing and the shoes fit around his feet. It’s subconscious almost.AKA Dylan is forced into an early retirement and communication is hard, clearly.
Relationships: Connor McDavid/Dylan Strome
Comments: 3
Kudos: 109





	Passing Through Unconscious States (By way of Pennsylvania and Arizona)

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote the first half of this like 6 months ago and now we’re here. The title is from Movie Script Ending by Death Cab because that’s just how it is

Connor McDavid wins the Stanley cup the same day his childhood best friend flies home. As Dylan sits on the worn down airport bench TVs flicker from CNN to ESPN. There’s Anderson Cooper, there’s a slim anchor with pretty blonde hair and neat white teeth. There’s the sports section and there’s Connor; there’s a decade of heartache and a twinge of reflexive joy. There’s the toddler waddling down the aisle and a mother soothing her baby, a man bouncing his leg steadily next to Dylan. Flight 203 boarding now, direct flight to Toronto. Would groups A and B board now? Would anyone needing assistance come to the counter? Dylan moves without thought. Here is my ticket and here is my luggage. Here are all the things I’ve left behind. 

If Dylan’s being honest -- which he isn’t when his mother slides a mug across the counter to her, kitchen kicked up in the smell of dark roast and French toast, slightly burned and sticky with syrup -- he’ll say he thinks about Connor as often as he thinks of the weather, as often as he thinks of the clothes he’s wearing and the shoes fit around his feet. It’s subconscious almost. 

Dylan swallows the coffee and wipes his mouth before telling her in a faux casual tone that  _ no mom, I haven’t heard from him lately but I don’t think of him much either.  _

That’s nice sweetie. Good for you. ( _ It just broke my heart when you first stopped being friends, when you couldn’t watch Ryan’s games without wincing _ .)

She doesn’t need to say these things for Dylan to understand -- he is a broken man in more ways than one. 

“How are the kids doing, sweetie?” Years ago, this question used to mean something else. 

  
  


Connor and Ryan do not win the Stanley cup the same night. Ryan wins the cup a year and two days before Connor, on home ice in Tampa Bay and Dylan’s mom cried sweet tears, tears that spoke for the hard work they all put in. All Ryan’s practice, all her hours driving him to and from practice, the paychecks spent on hockey pads and new skates, a new stick when his snapped in half in a rowdy scrimmage. She cried and Ryan cried and Dylan cried. For happiness. For pride. For the aching gap wheezing underneath his rib cage. For the migraines and surgeries and refilled prescriptions. For everything that never came to be, Dylan let the tears run down his face and let his mouth up turn and his hands grasp his older brother tightly and say  _ you did it. I’m proud of you. You earned it _ and felt that it was genuine. He wanted Ryan to have this. 

Dylan’s not deep, he’s never been profound or labeled wise or especially in-touch with his feelings or the greater function of human emotions. But on the ice of the Amalia amongst the sea of blue and snapping cameras he can feel the three rum and cokes he nervously chugged in the suite bathroom and the beers and the sweat from the nerves, from the everything and he understands something he could never articulate. This is a special moment. It’s not just Ryan’s but he’s not stupid or selfish enough to fully believe it’s his. Time itself is indulging him. There he is, surrounded by family and perspiration hockey jerseys as the Stanley cup (the “Stanley Fucking Cup, Dylan” as Ryan used to say when they started to grow up, but still reserved Saturday nights together in front of the TV) skates around the ice; this is not his moment. The dress shoes on his feet remind him of this. The special pass lanyard hung around neck signifies the differences no one needs to explain to him. 

In a different world, Dylan thinks, this is his life: the Coyotes draft Mitch, slim and charming and still dressed in blue, instead of him and Noah goes to Toronto, breaking both his and Mitch’s hearts (and Connor’s too, though he’ll never own up to the nagging surge of jealousy as his eyes track Noah when he skates out in blue and white striped socks and a careful leaf embedded on his very American chest) and Dylan goes fifth. He goes to Carolina and smiles happily as the stiff red jersey is pulled over his head. He’s not top three and he’s been drafted to a team with dreadful attendance in a random southern city but he’s content. His family is pleased, thrilled as they pose over and over again for photos because they need one more, for the Christmas card and  _ please Dylan! Smile one more time and Ryan stop fidgeting _ . 

Connor will still come to his room after everything winds down and his smile will burst at the seams and it’ll be so easy to laugh and joke about Connor’s brother feeding him drinks and how his cheeks will flush as Dylan reenacts the draft. How the pink of his cheeks will match the sweaty fluttery feeling inside Dylan’s gut. It’ll ache when Connor mentions the distance. Raleigh is a hell of a distance from Edmonton. Even further than Glendale (not that you spent much time there, Dylan stubbornly reminds himself). 

In this world, everything is okay. Dreamlike. Dylan plays with Jeff Skinner and carpools with Faulk. Maybe Staal invites him to dinner one night and says  _ well you know, Dylan you haven’t been producing much but it’ll come, I know it will. Work hard kid. _ And they’ll exchange niceties and slide him a glass of wine and joke about things like the drinking age and the Blue Jays trade rumors, the impending winter weather. 

Dylan won’t win the Calder, won’t even come close but the coils so familiarly wound in his chest, pressed solemnly against his heart will loosen and it won’t feel as though he is made of copper or iron or anything other metal of substantial weight. Dylan is light and free and can float as high as he wants to. The rent checks for his mostly unused apartment in Arizona won’t come to mind and neither will the still boxed frames of him and Connor as children. Carolina Dylan would be proud, he wouldn’t cower away from the success of someone he’s held so close to him, wouldn’t taste an achingly bitter residue as he catches McDavid highlight reels on the NHL network at the sports bar near his apartment. He wouldn’t dodge Mitch’s calls frequently because yes, even that hurts at times. Everything hurts, not just his knee as the weather changes or his head after staring at a screen for too long. That which blossoms behind his eyes is untamed. It is raw. 

It is, Dylan stubbornly acknowledges, all he restrains himself from feeling. 

The way he sees it, the person he is and the person he was supposed to be, destined to be, exist in different realms. Sometimes as he sits at his desk, pen poised in one hand as he grades test after test of fifth grade English he wonders when he fell through the cracks. He’d been casting stones for a long time (skip skip skip skip). There was the hit. The obvious, painful shift between all he’d worked for and all that he could no longer have. His grasp had slipped away so quickly as he laid useless and numb in his hospital bed, those stupid gripped socks on his feet. They were all he could stare at as the evaluation come through. Dylan, I’m sorry - 

We know this is important to you-

There’s nothing more we can do -

Skip. Skip. Skip. 

There was the moment they stopped being Dylan&Connor and shifted to just Dylan and Connor. Separate identities. A broken piece, at least in Dylan’s end, the phantom of former fantasies. 

Skip. Skip. 

The headaches. 

The bouncing between Glendale and Eerie. Tucson and Glendale. A call from management and a car ride in silence, a packed bag for an apartment never fully lived in. Over and over again. 

Skip fucking skip. 

There’s a stack of quizzes and worksheets on his desk and absently Dylan recognizes how alien he feels. It’s not always this angsty, he doesn’t always long for open sheets of ice and frequent practices, drills and team dinners and the bustling travel across the continent. He’s adjusted and mature, but sometimes he’ll see a team Canada shirt in the hallways and instinctively know whose last name will be stitched across the back and the echo of all skeletons in Dylan’s closet clanging together will ring painfully in his ears. 

( “One day,” Connor hums into his collar bone, “that’ll be us, Dyls. That’ll be you and me with gold medals around our necks.”)

You and me, Connor. What a pair we make!

If someone were to inquire to one Dylan Strome who his least favorite player of the National Hockey League was the answer would come easily and without much thought: Jordan Eberle. And here’s why: Sometimes it’s so obvious to Dylan that he’s misstepped. He remembers Ryan’s first game in Edmonton and the easy, familiar way his eyes followed warm ups. And somehow, for some stupid reason, he’d forgotten about this — the singular, brief moment when two forwards passed each other and the identical jerseys donned Strome and McDavid. McDavid and Strome: back and better than ever. Dylan feels sick. 

  
  


Do you believe in fate? Dylan doesn’t cry when Connor wins the Stanley Cup because the game is in Alberta, and all the way in Ontario it’s late. Dylan spent the day on a plane breathing recycled air and pointedly not letting his mind wander too far. It’s Sunday; It’s a weeknight. Dylan’s a teacher, he has responsibilities and daily alarms and a slew of book reports of Mike Lupica and The Outsiders to sit through at 9 am. The point is-

Dylan doesn’t watch game 7. He doesn’t watch Connor’s breakaway goal in the third, the unabashed joy gleaming Connor’s (finally properly bearded) face. Dylan’s in bed, wriggling through sweat soaked sheets when the timer runs out but for just a second -

Dylan thinks- he feels, like -

There’s no logical way he could know. But as Connor’s hands grasp the cool metal and hoist thirty five pounds worth of dreams and tears and therapy (physical and otherwise) and stupid, youthful promises, above his head, Dylan starts to cry. 

  
  


Dylan doesn’t talk about it with his mom. He doesn’t talk about it with Ryan, or with Mitch. Or with Mr. Gallagher from the third floor, who is far too nosy for his own good. 

He’s a little unhinged. Dylan’s an adult now and bottling shit up isn’t good, he knows that. He doesn’t need  _ Mitch Marner _ texting him that. He’d like to think he’s a little more mature than that. Dylan’s grown now, he doesn’t need pep talks from the guy who still can’t use a steamer or understand that you aren’t supposed to clean a cast iron skillet by soaking it overnight. 

He’s operating on a frightening level of faux chill Monday morning. There’s a week left of classes but he still snaps at the boys recapping the game to each other during silent reading time. Talking about the Oilers does not constitute as  _ silent _ reading, he reminds them sternly. Besides, he thinks stubbornly, they could at least talk about the Leafs or like, the Blue Jays. He’d rather them talk about the Coyotes than his ex boyfriend. There’s only so much he can handle on any given day. 

Dylan holes up in his apartment as summer winds down. He has lesson plans to outline and materials to organize and has to figure out how to make grammar appealing to 10 year olds. It’s not a purposeful ignoring, but after three days even he can admit his attitude is icy at best. He doesn’t have time to respond to every text Mitch sends him about whether or not he’s mature enough for a baby, an argument which has been spanning for at least 5 months already and can wait another week or so as Dylan is busy, doing his job. That he depends on for money. Sometimes Mitch seems to forget burning out as third overall in a draft twelve years prior doesn’t leave you swimming in cash. 

The point is - Dylan’s in his own bubble. He has mass market paperbacks and reading lists encroaching on the last clean spot of his kitchen table and a steadily increasing backlog of emails and there’s definitely marker somewhere errant on his skin. By 9 pm he’s sprawled on the kitchen floor, lazily drinking a beer with the Blue Jays sixth inning crackling through the radio. 

Dylan doesn’t believe in fate, but the Jays get a grand slam and his doorbell rings and in the confusion Dylan kicks his beer over a stack of notes. Everything is soppy and tinged with cheap hint of beer and the ringing has turned into a knocking. An aggressive, federal agent type of knock. And Dylan’s beautiful color coded notes are ruined so who can blame him when he groans with a frustration so akin to his hockey days it comes without a second thought, “fucking Christ, hold ON!”

A towel is through haphazardly behind him and the door springs open and -

Dylan doesn’t believe in fate but standing in front of him is a very sheepish Connor. And the Stanley Cup. 

“What.”

Dylan’s mouth works faster than his brain, until both stop functioning all together. 

Connor says  _ Hi _ in the same silky, sweet monotone and Dylan’s heart is fucking obliterated. He’s not 16 anymore and pining after his best friend. They’re not 18 and sneaking off centered, teeth clattering kisses in Dylan’s billet bedroom in Eerie. He’s not 19 and watching Dylan pull the crisp orange and blue jersey off his now crinkled draft shirt to climb into his hotel bed. They’re not desperate to hold on to each other, to pretend that this could work. 

Dylan’s 31 and not as lanky as he once was, even with the bulk of off season training. He’s not a professional athlete anymore, he’s not as rough around the edges. His body’s tired, not fully recovered from the missteps of years prior. He looks at Connor and his mouth runs dangerously dry. 

Staring at each other over the threshold, Connor rubs the back of his neck, a nervous habit not yet forgotten or grown out of. Dylan wants to snicker, but this isn’t Eerie or someone’s basement in Toronto. This isn’t a joke between friends. This is years of silence and unfinished conversations. 

But he’s there and a real, tangible force fretting with his cuff links. Connor is smiling is a crisply pressed blue button up, the top buttons undone enough to catch Dylan’s eyes. Connor’s not the same in ways that hurt him. He’s bigger, taking up the bulk of Dylan’s doorway. 

As the silence spans between them someone clears their throat pointedly. Behind Connor is a stiff black suit with a league official tie. The cup holder, Dylan thinks stupidly, remembering Ryan’s cup day. 

Connor’s voice is softer this time. 

“You have highlighter on your face.”

“You?”

“Hi.”

Dylan can’t breathe. He can’t breathe and that’s the excuse he feeds himself as he slams the door right on Connor’s face because -

Dylan still remembers waking up in the hospital and having everything he worked for wrenched out of his hands. He remembers the numbness or it all, the constant medical tests, the mandatory psych evaluation, the meeting with PR to announce his retirement. He remembers it all with a bitter aftertaste that tints every moment of joy as he catches his body moving in familiar patterns, as he furrows his brows as he catches a Leafs shootout at the bar, every reminder of a past life. Dylan woke up in the hospital and Connor wasn’t there. Dylan’s career, his dreams ended, and his best friend was fucking off in Edmonton with Taylor Hall. They weren’t boyfriends, but god weren’t they? Weren’t they at least something, Dylan begged. 

He pushes his palms to his eyes and sucks in three quick breaths. 

Connor’s still there when he reopens the door, gingerly so now. The cup is on the floor now and Connor’s pacing on the door mat. 

Dylan opens his mouth and tries out a simple  _ Hi _ . 

Dylan can do casual. He can do calm and polite, he can be cordial, until- 

“I love you.”

“What?” 

Connor whines, like they’re 17 again. “Can you please say something else?”

Dylan settles with, “Uhm.”

“I don’t know how to talk to you,” Connor explains. “You left Arizona without telling me and-“

“My career was over!”

“Your life wasn’t, though!” And Dylan pauses. Connor is, he’s steadying himself but a frantic edge is ebbing out of his voice. “Dylan, you — you retired without telling me. You fucked off to Ontario and didn’t say a word. For years. And I know this is late, but I had to bribe Ryan to find out your address-” and Dylan is going to kill his brother. “- because it wasn't right. None of it was right without you.”

Connor’s voice is softening now, his hands untangling themselves from his cuffs. “I loved you, Dylan. The whole time. Every day. I didn’t want to win the cup without you. Because I loved you.” He swallows audibly. “Because I  _ love _ you.”

“Oh,” Dylan says weakly and then he can’t stop himself. His hand is curled into Connor’s shirt and he’s tugging so slightly, afraid to push too hard. 

“I never- I thought, but I didn’t know. For sure.” Dylan blushes. 

Connor rolls his eyes. “It wasn’t a secret,” he intones, voice dropping sweetly. 

“I made Mitch promise to tell me about any of your injuries. Or any awards,” Dylan blurts out. “It was when I was still in the hospital. I pretended not to remember telling him, said it must have been the drugs.”

“So you’ve been stalking me for years?” Connor’s mouth quirks slightly.

“You showed up at my apartment. I don’t even know how you got into the building.”

Connor laughs and Dylan shouldn’t be this easy. Connor’s voice should make something blossom in his chest as fiercely as it did 5 years ago. 

Dylan belatedly remembers they aren’t alone. At least the cup handler has the decency to pretend not to be listening. 

“It’s your cup day.” Dylan doesn’t frame it as a question. Connor flushes. 

“I told you, it didn’t feel right.”

Dylan doesn’t believe in fate, but when he bridges the last few inches between them something feels right, this force bigger than himself. 

“I never wanted to lose you,” he admits softly, head buried in Connor’s neck. The stubble scratches with a pleasant burn across his cheek. “I looked for you everywhere. Every time I went to the grocery store I expected to see you in the produce section or at the mall or at Mitch’s house.” 

“Me too,” Connor breaths. 

He can’t rush into this. It’s been years and this can’t erase that, but with the heat of Connor’s body presses against him, Dylan can’t find a reason to argue with tugging him into the apartment. 

He doesn’t hesitate when Connor asks, “are you sure?”

Maybe, he reasons, it’s not about who he was supposed to be. It’s not about that at all. It’s about who he is now, about the hesitant smile poised on Connor’s lips. 

It’s not about what he left behind anymore. It’s about what’s ahead of him, about the calloused fingers tracing Dylan’s palm. He searches Connor’s face and recognizes the tilt of his head when he asks a question, the tenderness of his eyes, the crinkles (now more pronounced) around his eyes. 

“I love you,” Dylan says, because there isn’t a different world and there won’t be another draft and another shot at the NHL. But there’s his best friend that he’s been in love with since he was 16 waiting at his door, a Stanley Cup party abandoned by the guest of honor, and a very uncomfortable looking league employee pretending to give them space in his apartment hall way. 

“I love you,” Dylan repeats as easy as breathing. 


End file.
